RedHanded - ShortHand: Princess Anne’s Kidnap Chaos

Episode Date: September 18, 2026

This week, we’re taking you back to 1974 for a rollocking royal story that The Crown won’t tell you - the time a young Princess Anne was almost kidnapped by a gun-toting loner outside Buckingham Palace, in a shower of bullets and stiff upper lips.The Anne-cident changed royal security protocols forever. But would The Firm be changing their ways? Not bloody likely.Featuring an ex-boxer vigilante, a somersaulting princess and an outrageous extortion plot, you don’t wanna miss this one.--Patreon - Ad-free & Bonus EpisodesYouTube - Full-length Video EpisodesTikTok / Instagram

Hello. Hello. Round two. Yes. We just started recording and then realized that I had failed to plug the microphones into the roadcaster. Yeah. Out of touch my ass, humble over here. Plugging in our own mics.

I've been humbled. I've been fucking humbled. Anyway, a very royal welcome to shorthand for you this week. We are going to revisit the British royal family, even though she is my favourite in the world. Not going to talk about Princess Diana, because I'm going to talk about Princess Diana, because I'm going to visit. not allowed, but I do still think that the queen knocked her off. And I will argue that toss with anybody, but mainly my mum. She will.

Don't fight her. So, if you have seen the crown, which I feel like most people, even I've seen the crown, me too. Season three of Netflix's smash hit introduced us to a young hot princess Anne. She's pouty and serving looks and being very, very hoarsy. She's still very, very horsey. I think Zara's her daughter, isn't she? Zara, Olympic horsewoman.

She is, indeed. But what the Crown did not show you was a very, very insane occurrence that happened to Princess Anne in 1974. When the 23-year-old, Big Liz and Prince Phillips' only daughter was almost kidnapped by a lone gunman on a twisted vigilante mission. The botched abduction attempt went down over just ten action-packed minutes

with a shower of bullets, rogue Xbox's throwing punches and a tussle resulting in a ripped dress and one seriously pissed off princess. Despite ending up on Netflix's cutting room floor years later, this incident blew a bullet-shaped hole into the monarchy's security regime, changing protocol forever but didn't stop them knocking off Diana. is the shorthand. Now, before we tell you this story today, we should put some other things into context just a little bit.

The 1970s was a pretty big decade for the British royal family. For centuries before, the royals had been semi-mythical remote figures. You'd have to line up in the streets for just a glimpse of them passing by, or maybe tune into the occasional speech on the wireless. But now, the royals were in... people's living rooms around the world, through the power of television. The explosion and access to colour TV, with a number of sets in UK homes doubling from 100,000 to 200,000 between 1969 and 1970,

so just in one year, they doubled, and growing to a whopping 1.6 million by 1972, it all meant that now we could gorp at our royals in glorious technicolor, in the privacy of our own homes. Now while we weren't yet at the peak of the media storm that surrounded Princess Diana in the 1990s, this was certainly the start of the wave of royals becoming celebrities. As Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip's children reached young adulthood,

the spotlight was firmly on the next generation of royal brats. At 23, newlywed Princess Anne was the young starlet of the four. firm, which, if you need reminding, is what Prince Philip called his family. In November 1973, 500 million people worldwide watched Princess Anne's televised wedding to famed equestrian, Captain Mark Phillips. It was the highest ever viewership for a royal wedding, until her big brother Charles hit 750 million views in 1981. That's mental.

Yes. What? Obviously when he married Lady Diana. Yes, yes, yes. After trying to fuck her sister. Diana's sister? He went out with Diana's older sister before he went out with her. Oh, I didn't know that.

I mean, you know, I obviously love her. It is not the Rexter Rich's story. No. People think it is. She was also 14 or something when he first met her. But, you know, he shagged her sister first. Oh, well, there you go. But Anne, on the other hand, never really had the showy personality of Diana.

she was much more interested in horses than in ballgans or glamour and she still is. But that didn't really matter to the press. She was still hot property. With her immaculate outfits and her iconic, cemented, unmoving hair, Princess Anne was the Kate Middleton of her time. Yeah, you can't have hair like flapping about when you're on a horse. No, certainly not. Hair spray that down.

But amid this period of intense media change, the royals hadn't quite caught up to the new challenges that arose from being quite so visible in the public eye. Starting with their security regime, or should we say, lack thereof. In 1974, Princess Anne had only one police bodyguard assigned to protect her during royal engagements. And by his own admission, there was, quote, no special training for the job. To be honest, as far as anyone knew, there was no real need for her. because there had been no credible attacks on British royalty for almost a century by that point. Not since the reign of the great dame herself, Queen Victoria.

Victoria, who was the one who brought haemophilia into the gene pool, let's remember, racked up a total of seven attempts on her life during her long reign. She was unsuccessfully shot at in 1840, in 1942 and in 1849 by a succession of disgruntled working-class men. And in 1850, Robert Pate, a soldier with the nickname Mad Pate. No one's trying that hard, are they? Randomly beat Queen Victoria over the head with his metal-tipped cane in the street in Piccadilly. In 1872, a teenage rebel scaled the walls of Buckingham Palace to threaten Victoria with a pistol and with a knife.

And there was one last near miss, another shooting that happened in 1882. writing to her daughter about this final attempt, Queen Victoria reflected. It is worth being shot at to see how much one is loved. Yikes. It's one way to look at it. Anyway, after the Victorian era came to a close, things on the Royal Assassination Front were quiet for some time. So, by 1974, after nearly a century of incident-free calm,

It just so happened that the stage was set for an almighty storm. At around 8pm on the 20th of March 1974, a maroon-Austin-Austin-Prasse limousine, marked with royal insignia, trundled down the mall towards Buckingham Palace. In the back was Princess Anne, her husband, Captain Mark Phillips, and Anne's lady-in-waiting, Rowena Jane Brassy. The limo was driven by Alexander Callender. one of the Queen's chauffeurs.

Anne's assigned police bodyguard Inspector James Wallace Beaton of Scotland Yard's S.O14 branch for Royal Protection, known as Jim, sat in the front passenger seat. It was, by all accounts, an ordinary night. The Royal newlyweds had attended a charity film screening by riding for the disabled,

a cause that they both supported as Olympian equestrians. And they were heading back to Buckingham Palace, presumably for a nightcap and bed. But about 200 yards away from the palace, a white Ford escort overtook the limousine and forced the chauffeur to stop abruptly. As a bearded man with light red hair climbed out of the car, Inspector Jim Beaton stepped out to meet him,

assuming he was some sort of disgruntled driver. But this was not your average case of road rage. The man, 2016, year old Ian Ball was brandishing two handguns. And from six feet away, he shot police officer Jim Beaton in his right shoulder. And with that, of course, all hell broke loose. Beaton instinctively drew his own weapon and shot back at Ball. But his shoulder wound affected his accuracy, so he missed. And the timing just got worse. Beaton's gun jammed next. And whilst he desperately tried to the blockage to no avail. Ball ordered him to drop his gun or he would shoot Princess Anne.

So, as Ball made a beeline for the back of the limousine, Inspector Beaton was forced to lay his now useless weapon on the ground, leaving him utterly unarmed. Meanwhile, Ball was trying to yank open the back door of the driver's side screaming, open or I'll shoot. As Captain Phillips and Anne battled to keep the door shut from the inside, Lady-in-waiting Rowena Brassy grabbed her chance to crawl out of the passenger side and make a run for it. As a lady-in-waiting...

Uh-huh. Should you not wait? Is it... Yes. I don't know if you're allowed to just cut and run. She's like, fuck this shit. Thing is, if she stays... I was going to say, if she stays,

no one's going to give her a medal, but they might. They literally might, yes. They literally might, yes. It's one of the few places where they actually might do that. But if you're dead, then you've just got a medal. So, you know, swings the roundabouts. And as she made a break for it, wounded Inspector Beaton jumped in the car

and wedged himself between the royal couple and Ball forming a human shield. What, hero? Yeah, I mean, I hope he did get a medal for this. As Ball raised his gun to the window, Beaten raised his hand. The window shattered. The bullet slicing through Beaton's outstretched

hand and littering the limousine with shards of broken glass. Beaton yelled for Captain Phillips to let go of the door so he could kick it open and hopefully knock ball off balance. But before he could pull this off, Ball managed to open the door and shoot Beaton for the third time in the stomach. That's serious business. So now Beaton seriously injured, fell out of the car and lay bleeding at Ball's feet. Now, the chauffeur, Alexander Callender, stepped out to confront Ball.

With a gun to his head, Callender bravely wrestled with Ball in an attempt to disarm him, until he too ended up being shot in the chest. Shit was getting very real. With her chauffeur and bodyguard down, Princess Anne found herself face to face with a trigger-happy gunman, who had proven he could, and would, fire. The whole time during his shooting spree, Ball had been pleading with Princess Anne to get out of the car and come with him. But Anne was having none of it.

She later described their encounter as a rather tedious conversation, where Ball repeatedly tried to coax her out to move, to which she famously retorted, not bloody likely. But she wouldn't have sounded like that. It's iconic. Truly. It's very, very famous. I do not understand. How was this not in the crown? Why? So, with the princess, refusing to budge,

Ball took matters into his own hands and tried to yank Princess Anne out of the car himself. What ensued was a tug of war, with Ball on one side and Captain Phillips on the other, and stretching his wife. In the struggle, Princess Anne's dress ripped down the back. Something she later equipped was, his most dangerous moment as she lost her rag.

But before Anne could unleash her royal wrath, Ian Ball was again distracted by the arrival of a young policeman, Michael Hills, who was on patrol nearby. Ball shot Hills in the stomach at close range, but before he collapsed, Hills managed to radio his station for backup. I would also argue that targeting a royal, on the Mao is kind of the worst place to do it. Honestly, this is so like, so British but so un-British.

All these people getting shot left, right and centre. So things were very quickly going south. Enter Ronnie Russell, a company cleaning exec, who was driving home from work when he saw the chaos unfolding down the mall. Now Russell wasn't just any old guy. He was a former boxer who trained at the infamous Repton Club in East London, sponsored by none other than the Cray Twins. And when he saw Ball attack Officer Hills, he said to himself, he needs sorting.

As Russell made his way over, he wasn't the only brave passerby getting stuck in either. Another chauffeur named Glenmore Martin had parked his car in front of the White Ford to block Ball from escaping. Martin had also tried to distract Ball. But when Ball turned his gun towards him, having watched him just taped down three other guys already, Martin sensibly decided to retreat and focus his efforts on tending to the injured officer hills. Journalist John Brian McConnell, who'd been in the car behind the limousine as he'd been covering the royal event, approached Ball and said, don't be silly old boy, put the gun down. But sadly, Ball did the opposite and he actually shot McConnell in the stomach.

With four men now lying bleeding, Ball turned his attention back to Princess Anne, who was was now lying on the limousine floor with her husband. Just as Ronnie Russell, all six-foot-four of him, landed a punch to the back of Ball's head. Seizing her chance, Princess Anne reached behind her head for the door handle, rolled backwards and threw her feet over her head to exit the car in a somersault. But as Ball gave chase, Princess Anne jumped back into the car and shut the door, while Russell sucker-punched Ball in the chin and sent him in a summer-salt. down like a sack of spuds. And then some more police started to show up.

The net was starting to close on Ian Ball, and he knew it. He was panicked. And noticing that he was in a state of distress, Princess Anne dryly said to him, Go on, now's your chance. And Ball didn't need to be told twice. Abandoning his kidnap attempt, he legged it. But he was not free for long. One of the arriving coppers, Detective Constable Peter Edmonds,

saw ball running with a gun through St James's Park. And he ran after him and tackled him to the ground. After a frantic 10 or 15 minutes, the chaos was over. Thankfully, all four men who were wounded made a full recovery from their injuries. Which is no, like, small thing being shot on the stomach is really bad. You bleed so much. Honestly, I am shocked by this.

Another reason for why I cannot believe they didn't. included because they could have had some fun with this, like they all survived. Inspector Jim Beaton was the most severely wounded. He still has a bullet fragment lodged in his hand as a grisly souvenir and was visited by a grateful Princess Anne during his convalescence in hospital. While he and Anne chatted, Beaton noticed that she was flanked by two officers rather than just the usual one, the first indicator of how things will change for royal security from now on. That September, Queen Elizabeth bestowed the heroes of the hour with various medals

for their courage in protecting her daughter. Not you, Rowena. The George Cross, Britain's highest civilian award for courage, went to Jim Beaton, rightly so. Police constable Michael Hills and Ronald Russell both received the George Medal, which is the second highest. Police Constable Edmonds, John Brian McConnell and Alexander Callender all got the third highest. honor of Queen's gallantry medals. And the Queen's commendation for brave conduct was given to Glenmore Martin. Giving Ronnie Russell his medal, the Queen reportedly said,

the medal is from the Queen of England. The thanks is from Anne's mother. And what you have done for China? Oh, I cry. That's good. That's a good line. The immediate audio was over, but the real questions were about to begin. Who the hell was Ian Bull? Why had he targeted Princess Anne? Back in the 70s, politically motivated kidnappings were gaining traction. The troubles were just kicking off, along with other conflicts worldwide.

Just a month earlier in February 1974, American heiress Patty Hurst had been kidnapped by a left-wingeerie group called the Symbionese Liberation Army, and she is a story for another day. But essentially, Patty Hurst captors, demanded that her wealthy newspaper magnate family leveraged the release of imprisoned activists and donate $400 million worth of food to hungry Californians. And since Princess Anne, as technically an heiress to the oldest magnet in the world,

the British royal family, it was natural for people to assume that a similar thing had happened to Anne. But it wasn't really. Although a few days after the botch kidnapping on the mall, a political group calling themselves the Marxist-Leninist activist revolutionary movement, jumped on the bandwagon and claimed responsibility for the attempted abduction in a letter that they sent at the Times. But Scotland Yard quickly dismissed any connection between the group with the longest name in the world and Ian Ball. Background checks showed absolutely no link between Ball and any political or religious movement or group. Actually, he was just a loner with no friends.

So who was this lone wolf wannabe kidnapper, if we can call him that? He just sounds like a bit of a loser. age 26 at the time Ian Ball was an unemployed former labourer with a history of some pretty serious mental issues his plan to kidnap Princess Anne began two years earlier when he moved from a grottie bed sit in Bayswater

to a house in fleet in Hampshire just five miles from Anne and Captain Mark Phillips's residence at Sandhurst Military Academy I didn't know they lived at Sandhurst No, there you go. In police interviews, Ball explained that he'd seen Anne and her husband outriding often in the local area. Perhaps this is where his fixation began.

Ball was allegedly inspired by Frederick Forsyte's novel, The Day of the Jackal, where an ultra-stealthy assassin is hired to murder the president of France, Charles de Gaulle. It's also a series or a film. Eddie Redmayne plays him. Yeah, I tried to watch it as a series, and I was like, I'm bored. I tried to listen to the audio book and I was like, I'm bored. Yeah. To death.

It was just, it's just so, like, it's just ridiculous. It's not a superhero film and he has, like, no issues. You know what I mean? It's like, everything he does just works. Oh, right. And I'm like, oh my God, this is so fucking boring. Anyway, if you're going into the realms of reality, it's nothing like that because look at what Ian Ball did, very much less jackal and much more jackass. Because for all the years,

in the making this plan may have been. Ball's kidnapping plan was hardly a sophisticated plot that required special insider knowledge. In March 1974, all he had to do was ring up the press office at Buckingham Palace and ask what Princess Anne was up to that week for her royal engagements. And on the night itself,

it was possible for anyone to follow the royal stamped limo on its short journey back to the palace, which is exactly what Ball did. Some degree of planning had taken place. Ball had rented a car under the alias John Williams, and in it police found Valium tranquilizers and two sets of handcuffs. But in short, Ball chanced his arm and got lucky. Well, until it all went wrong, that is.

We never had to find out because it went so horribly wrong, but we should wonder, what did Ball actually want from Princess Anne? What was his plan once he abducted her? We don't really know, but there are, theories. Money is perhaps the simplest answer because police found a ransom letter in Ball's car. The typed rambling note criticised the royal family and asked for three million quid in ransom and he wanted it all in five pound notes. Oh my God. And not just the specifics

of the five pound note, no, no, he actually demanded that the cash be delivered in 20 unlocked suitcases on a private plane destined for Switzerland, which is where he attended to escape to. even more bizarrely Ball insisted that Queen Elizabeth herself needed to appear on said plane to confirm the authenticity of her signatures on various documents but it transpired

apparently Ball had his own warped charitable mission in mind inspired by his own poor experiences of mental health care in the UK he declared his intention was to donate the ransom money to the National Health Service in five pound notes In five-pound notes, yeah.

And then he would become the leader of the reform party. Whether he would have given the money to the NHS or not, we just will never know. But ultimately, we can't really say for sure what Ball's motives truly were. Because he was suffering with acute mental illness at the time of the attempted kidnapping. Before his trial, Ball was diagnosed with schizophrenia and sentenced to a high security psychiatric facility for life. He said to observe the bulk of his sentence at the infamous Broadmoor Hospital, home to notorious wrongens, including serial killer Peter Sutcliffe, Britain's most violent prisoner Charles Bronson, and gangster Ronnie Cray.

Ironically, Ball said in his police interview that the one good thing to come out of the whole incident was that they would now have to improve Princess and security. And he wasn't wrong. According to Inspector Jim Beaton, who was later promoted to become the Queen's police officer in 1982, Royal Security Protocol changed overnight. I also love that. She's just like, you were pretty good, Jim.

Fuck my daughter. Do you want to come? Don't come be my police officer? I leave the house a lot less, Jim, really. Members of the royal family were immediately all given two bodyguards rather than just one. Guns and ammo were also improved, and special training was put.

in place for members of S.O.14, the Scotland Yard branch in charge of royal protection. Which it seems like was just one guy before this happened. Can you call that a branch, a twig? And it turns out that the firm would need this enhanced security because the incident opened the floodgates to a raft of other run-ins for the royals. Maybe that's why they didn't put it in there. They're like, stop publicising it. People are coming after us. Well, you know, she nearly got Crospo, didn't she? Stay tuned for top secret

project that we can't talk about, but someone tried to shoot the Queen with Crospo. For reasons. Yes. Robot reasons. Sexy robot reasons. Stay tuned. Yes, stay tuned. But of course, that is the most recent one. There were lots of others.

Most famously, Lord Mountbatten was assassinated in 1979 in Sligo by the IRA. And in 1981, a teenager fired blank shots at Queen Elizabeth during the trooping of the colour. And then the year after that, an unemployed man called Michael Fagan broke into the Queen's actual bedroom, like in the BFG. And then, of course, in 1994, then Prince Charles, now King Charles, was shot at with blanks during a speech in Sydney on Australia Day. And as recently as 2021, as I alluded to 19-year-old Jaswan Singh-Chail, broke into the grounds of Windsor Castle armed with a crossbow and a deadly plan to kill the Queen. The topic of royal security and how much taxpayers should be paying for it is a touchy subject nowadays.

An internal police budget from 2010 revealed that approximately £113.5 million were spent on royal security. But this figure reportedly plummeted to 50 million by just 2012. So they're not giving it to Harry and Megan No. Who is stretched. Yeah, no. They're obviously a big reason for why it's a touchy subject was all of the stuff to do with Harry and Megan.

And also the like senior royals who are actually still serving has like shrunk loads. So King Charles did come out and say that he really wanted to operate on much more of a like tight budget. And I'll be fair, to reduce it by over 50% in two years is pretty good going. Now, as we grow more critical. of the monarchy as an institution in this country, it makes sense that we're not quite as thrilled

about the idea of paying for their protection. As we said, the debate flared up again in 2020, when Prince Harry and Meghan Markle's retreat from royal duties meant that their tax-funded security detail was severely downgraded. But the Princess Anne affair, relegated to the annals of history and ignored by Netflix for some reason, as it may be,

does serve as a reminder that these people are a higher risk purely because of who they are. although we guess that they can also afford the bill themselves. Yeah, because we fucking pay it to them anyway. The 1974 incident didn't just affect royal security protocols. It also had a more subtle influence on the royal's brand, their image and their reputation. And that's where Anne's reaction to what happened

is an important thing to think about. Unlike Patty Hurst, who ended up sympathising with her captor's ideals, Princess Anne certainly did not drink any coolade I know it was my favourite actually I really ruined someone's day the other week

you'll fucking love this it's in the kitchen upstairs in the office and I overheard someone talking about the phrase or like to drink the Kool-Aid and she was like I wonder what that's from

is it like someone spiked it a party or something I was like no 909 people committed revolutionary suicide in Guyana because they believed in a socialist utopia happy Monday and they all just looked at me like tell me you're autistic without telling me you're autistic

oh my God that's amazing I do love that thank you for sharing you're welcome glad to be of service that's how you should have ended that your friendly neighbourhood morbid fact spitter outer that's the new name of the podcast

I would also like to add that I've never spoken to literally any one of them before I believe it because we do not sexualise anyway Rather than changing allegiances like Patti Hurst did, Princess Anne always downplayed the incident. And she joked about it in a 1983 interview on Parkinson,

dismissing Ian Ball as a lone nutcase rather than a credible threat. And sure, security protocols were discreetly stepped up. But Buckingham Palace issued a statement immediately after the incident, making it very clear that the royals had no intention of living in bulletproof cages. Or Popemobiles. And that might seem like the classic stiff upper lip attitude expected from the royal family. Never explain, never complain.

Mm-hmm. But it also gives us a pretty telling insight into how the British monarchy continues to sustain itself as a cultural institution, especially in the face of mounting criticism over the years. Never complain, never explain, which sometimes I like to use as my own motto personally in life, it is the key philosophy attributed to Queen Elizabeth II's long and successful reign. It's basically a PR strategy that has enabled the monarchy to reinforce its legitimacy by rising

above potential scandals, by basically acting like they're not even worth the paper they're published on. Attacks on royals could be seen as attacks on the institution of the monarchy itself, so it's vital not to let even a crack of air in. Had Anne reacted differently, perhaps showed fear or cowed in some way, it could have planted a seat of doubt that maybe the royals did need to be brought out a peg or two, and that some sort of ordinary pleb could do it. In terms of its lasting legacy,

the almost kidnapping was an early opportunity for Anne to establish the kind of royal she was going to be. Rather than the chaotic spare, like, for example, my favourite Princess Margaret and my least favourite Prince Harry, Anne would prove herself to be a pragmatic stoic worker bee who quietly upholds royal traditions. She still does.

It's much more dignified, isn't it? Yes. But I'd much rather have a drink with Margaret. Oh yeah. Royal historian Mok O'Keefe notes that Princess Anne showed immense assertiveness, grit and determination that would go on to serve her well in her public role. And the infamous, not bloody likely, evokes a kind of blitz. spirit, very keep calm and carry on. And that is cultural catnip for quite a lot of people.

Yeah. There's some great phrases from the royals. I think not bloody likely. Great. Never complain, never explain. Great. And then also, of course. The one that is now quibbled over who actually said it, whether it was Kate or the queen about Megan Markle, recollections may vary. That's a good one. That's got big liz all over it, I reckon. It was good. It was after the Oprah interview and she was like, well. Recollections may very. It's a great one.

And then obviously Prince Harry's most famous quote. Weir! I was literally going to do that. Jinks. Oh, man. That's good. And there is one person who is still a very big fan of Princess Anne who was involved that night. Ronnie Russell.

Love Ronnie. Love Ronnie. But he did sell his George medal at auction. Fair enough, man. Took it on Antiques Roadshow. And he sold it for 50,000 pounds. Do you know what? I love that for Ronnie.

Do you know what I kind of do? What you can do with a fucking medal? Get 50,000 pounds in the bank. Sure. Done. But still, he holds Anne very close to his heart. He calls her a very special person. And he also threw shade at King Charles

by saying that Anne was the true second in line to the throne. Oh my God. Let's not have a revolted. No, I think what I would do if I got a medal like that is I would just go get a replica made and then sell it. sell the original. No one's going to know.

No? My great, great grandkids aren't going to fucking know. And as for the princess, she did not let her brush with death break her stride. Quipping once again in 2021. The one thing about horses and sport is you have to prepare for the unexpected.

Love it. So don't fuck with Princess Anne is what we've learned. Don't do it. And if you get a George medal, they're fobbing you off because George Cross is better. Yeah. And that's what they did to Sherpetenzie. Oh, there you go.

The bastard. So that's it, guys. Now you all know what really happened when they tried to kidnap Princess Anne because you won't learn it from the crowd. So that's it. We'll see you next week. Very different short-hand.

Goodbye. Bye.